IRCTC Website Hackers Arrested By CBI

Have you ever tried to book a Tatkal Railway ticket on Indian Railway and
failed? How do some travel agents manage to confirm railway ticket booking
under Tatkal category, while thousands of passengers make unsuccessful bids on
their computers or at reservation counters? Well, it seems it is all
programmed.

The Central Bureau of Investigation earlier this week
arrested Ajay Garg, a programmer who worked with the probe agency, for
allegedly developing a software to cheat IRCTC. According to the CBI, Ajay Garg had allegedly developed a
software that could simultaneously book more than a thousand tickets through
one portal.

The software creates an auto-fill system where details of a
large number of ticket-seekers are entered and kept ready even before tatkal
bookings open on the ticketing authority IRCTC's website at 10 am for trains
departing the next day. The illegal software then speed up the
PNR generating process, bypassing the IRCTC's captcha guard a feature to avoid
spam and allowing login with multiple identities. A single click of the mouse
will then book multiple tickets simultaneously.

According to a CBI officer, while working in IRCTC, Garg
“identified loopholes in the ticketing software of the railway service
provider. In 2012, after clearing his UPSC exams, he joined the CBI and
developed the software a year ago.” Garg put his ‘expertise’ to good use and
developed the fake software along with his partner in crime Anil Kumar Gupta.
The agents were paid a premium amount by the passengers for the completion of
their ticketing process.

The software would
automatically register the number of tickets taken by each agent and Garg would
collect money per ticket from agents. Garg, who is alleged to be the
mastermind, acted in the background, while his front, Gupta, distributed the
software to travel agents and collected money on his behalf. It was also
revealed that accused were allegedly receiving money from the dealers for the
use of said software through Bitcoins and hawala network.

Revelations After CBI Crackdown:-

During its searches, the CBI has found Rs 89.42 lakh in
cash, gold jewellery worth Rs 61.29 lakh — including two gold bars of 1 kg
each, 15 laptops, 15 hard disks, 52 mobile phones, 24 SIM cards, six routers,
four dongles, 19 pen drives and other incriminating material from the premises
of Garg and 10 travel agents — seven in Jaunpur and three in Mumbai.

The distribution of the software to dealers helped the
accused amass huge amounts of money, said CBI. "All such software's are
under scanner. We are examining them and may soon take action, if any
illegality is found in their operations," a CBI officer said.